Escape to Witch Mountain (13 page)

“I guess it was early yesterday morning.”

“Ump! That's a long stretch. And there are no hamburger stands in this direction. If you can hold out for another hour, I'll cook you up a real camp dinner.”

Tony twisted about in the narrow space until he and Tia had made themselves fairly comfortable. Winkie, curled on a blanket between them, began purring contentedly.

The sound of the tires changed as they turned into a gravel road. The motor labored as they began to climb. Tony realized they must
be well into the mountains. He was wondering if it would be safe to raise the tarpaulin and glance out, when all at once there came to him a clear recollection of Uncle Bené.

It was only a flash, followed by other flashes that seemed to have no connection: Uncle Bené speaking to them, taking them from a place where they'd been imprisoned; and a sudden frightening memory of an accident or a wreck—was it a smashed lifeboat?…

“Tia!” he said. “Tia, I've just remembered some things! Weren't we in a lifeboat—one that was wrecked?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “But don't ask me about it now.”

“Tia, this is important!”

“I know it, but Stony Creek is more important. It was one of the things Uncle Bené told us not to forget. If I were not so tired, I think I could remember it all…”

“He must have told us to go there, because it was marked on the map.”

“Yes, he did…” Her voice sounded very weary.

“He told us to go there and —and meet someone.”

“Who?”

“Someone named—Castaway.”

I
t was nearly twilight when Father O'Day stopped the car, announced that all was safe, and the two passengers crawled stiffly from their hiding place.

Tony hardly knew what to expect. A few minutes earlier the car had turned from the gravel road and gone winding and bumping upward on a grade that had seemed almost too much for it. Now he peered about wordlessly, drinking in sights and sounds and smells he had never dreamed of experiencing.

They seemed to be high up in a glade of crowding evergreens. The air was cold and sweet with a forest fragrance, and alive with birdsong and the chuckle and gurgle of water running over rocks. Turning, he saw a small brook that came down out of the shadows in a series of crystal pools. In the deep blue of the valley far below he was aware of the wild rush of a larger stream. As he raised his eyes to a break in the foliage, he gasped at the sight of a great forested mountain slowly vanishing in a veil of mist.

“Like it?” said Father O'Day, lifting a frying pan and a coffeepot from the trunk of the car.

Tia nodded, and Tony said, “It's great! Where—where are we?”

“You might call it the backyard of an old fellow I know. He lives on the other side of the mountain, but I have permission to camp here whenever I wish.”

The priest drew soap and towels from the trunk. “Take your pick of the pools, and get yourselves cleaned up. By the time you're through, dinner will be ready.”

“B-but don't you need our help?”

“Not this evening. You've been on the run for three days. You'll be surprised how much better a bath and a change of clothes will make you feel.”

Tony, after he had chosen his pool and stripped off his dirty clothing, was astounded at the icy coldness of the water. Presently, after he had rubbed down and changed to a clean shirt and jeans from his bag, his shivering stopped. Now, as he smelled the woodsmoke, he was suddenly aware of the overpowering aroma of food being cooked over a campfire.

It was corned beef hash, enough of it to have served twice their number. Before they ate, Father O'Day gave a heartfelt prayer.

“Heavenly Father,” the big man began, ''we thank you for giving us sanctuary for the night. Please forgive the foolish, the ignorant, and the greedy who have beset us, and help us to solve the tangled problem that has brought us so far. Amen.”

It was black dark when they finished eating, and the fire had died to a glowing mass of coals. The priest tossed a few sticks upon the embers, and in the light of their burning the pans were cleaned, and tarpaulins, camp mattresses, and blankets were spread around the fire.

“Before we have our powwow,” the priest said, “I think we'd better rest a bit. Frankly, it's been quite a day.”

Tony, wearily drawing a blanket about him, was asleep before his head touched the mattress.

When he awoke, hours later, the clock he instantly visualized told him that it was after three in the morning. It was about the same time, he remembered, that he had wakened in the barn when the bears came. Was it only yesterday? So much had happened that it seemed like days and days had gone by…

Suddenly he remembered Uncle Bené. He raised up and glanced quickly over at Tia, hoping she was awake. By the vague light of the stars that came through the break in the foliage, he could make out her huddled form. She was still asleep, apparently clutching Winkie, for he could hear a soft purring coming from the blanket. In spite of his eagerness to find out all about Uncle Bené, he did not have the heart to disturb her.

As he realized by the steady breathing on the other side of him that Father O'Day was also asleep, Tony's mind turned to Witch Mountain. Earlier, on the way to camp, he'd visualized the place, but had seen only another sprawling mountain, half shrouded in mist, rising above a deep gorge where a stream ran white over boulders. Now, hopefully, he managed to picture it again, but not the faintest light broke its expanse of darkness. It did look sort of haunted, though.

Haunted? No, he told himself, the place wasn't haunted, and there were no such things as witches. Unless—and the skin on his neck prickled at the thought—he and Tia really did belong to the witch tribe. But that couldn't be true. And he'd better forget the story he'd overheard at the bridge. It was just a lot of superstitious bunk, the sort of thing that ignorant people were always imagining. Probably there never had been anyone living on Witch Mountain, and if he had any sense he'd put the whole thing out of his mind.

Only, there'd been that part about the witches returning—at about the time he and Tia were trying to escape and come here with Uncle Bené. And there was that mention of lights and music.
Music?
…

Unconsciously Tony reached for his harmonica and raised it to his lips. As he breathed softly into it, and a little sadly, he wondered what kind of music his people would have played—if there
had
been music on the mountain, and if it had been
his
people who had played it. Probably it would have been forest music—the kind he could hear all about him now in the chirp of crickets, the song of the brook, and the mysterious little movements of unknown forest creatures that he was aware of all about him.

The melody that began to flow from his harmonica blended with the brook's song and the whisper of the night wind. Leaves played tag overhead, and two rabbits ventured into the starlit glade. They were followed by another and another; as the music continued, still larger listeners appeared—several does with fawns who ringed the glade, enthralled by this curious and lovely magic of the night.

Then abruptly the spell was broken by a very human cough. In a flash all the listening creatures vanished in the shadows. Grumbling, Father O'Day sat up.

“Forgive me for being a dolt! Ah, Tony, I held that cough back as long as I could. You may not be a witch, my boy, but that was pure witchery you were creating. Did you see all the deer?”

“Yes, sir.” They were the first wild ones he'd ever seen, and ordinarily he might have been amazed by the sight. But somehow, here in this seclusion of the forest, it seemed perfectly natural. All at once he knew that, no matter what happened, he and Tia could never go back and live in the city.

Tia, he saw, was also awake and sitting up. She said, “Did you see the littlest fawn, Tony? It was the cutest thing! Oh, I hope we have
lots
of animals where we're going.”

Tony managed not to laugh. The way animals took up with Tia, she'd probably need a whole mountain to herself. “We don't know where we're going yet,” he said. “Let's hear the rest about Uncle Bené.”

“Just a moment,” said Father O'Day. “Before you get too far ahead of me, give me a chance to catch up. Tony, who was Uncle Bené?”

“He was the man who was bringing us to America. Tia remembered him first. That got me started, and I've been remembering more about him ever since…”

Tony closed his eyes, and said, “He was a small, quick man with a beard—not a relative, but he was one of us, and we loved him. We'd been caught in a lot of trouble—soldiers were everywhere— and we were trying to escape and reach the sea.” He glanced at the dark bulk of Father O'Day in the shadow beyond him, and asked, “Do you remember about any trouble in Europe at that time?”

“Yes,” the big man said. “There was a rebellion in Hungary against the communists, and for a long time afterward there was scattered trouble here and there.”

“Well, all I can remember about it now is that Tia and I were prisoners, and were kept in an old house with a high wall around it. We hadn't seen Uncle Bené for weeks and weeks, not since the accident—”

“Accident?” the priest said quietly.

“Yes. Tia will have to explain about that. It's coming back to me—that there
was
an accident, and our lifeboat was smashed. Is that right, Tia?”

“Yes,” she whispered, as if it hurt her to speak.

“It seems that Tia, Uncle Bené, and myself were the only ones who were not hurt or killed. Then the soldiers came and captured us all.” Tony paused, and said, “Why would they treat people that way?”

“Because human rights and human suffering mean nothing to a communist,” the big man growled. “Only the state is important to them.”

“Oh, I see. Well, Uncle Bené managed to get away. He was like Tia—no lock could hold him. And of course Tia was too small to open locks at that time. Anyway, when the fighting started, Uncle Bené came and took us out of the house where we were, and escaped with us. We spent days running and hiding until we reached the coast. It seems that Uncle Bené had had time to plan how to get us away—he'd written over here for money, and he'd made a deal with the captain of a Spanish ship. He didn't trust the man, but it was our only chance…”

Tony paused, unconsciously clenching his hands as he recalled the terror and heartbreak of that experience. Then he hastened on, telling of their last night ashore in the stone barn, of slipping down to the beach in the dawn, and of getting away in the little boat just as the soldiers discovered them and began to fire.

“We didn't know Uncle Bené had been hit. He—he managed to hide it for a while. When he realized he was dying, he put the rest of his money in Tia's star box, along with his map, and told us we'd have to go on to America without him. He said he'd given the captain instructions about where to send us when we got over here—only he didn't have faith in the captain, and was afraid something might go wrong. So he told us to pay careful attention while he explained what we'd have to do.”

Tony stopped a moment while he tried to think. “I—I don't remember all he said. I couldn't possibly. But Tia does—only it got sort of blocked in her mind because of the things that happened. Anyway, it's coming back to both of us now. You know the rest of it—to the captain we were just another pair of refugees, and he didn't want to be bothered with us. So he called Mr. Deranian, who left us with Granny.”

There was a long silence when Tony finished. At last Father O'Day got up and rebuilt the fire, and put the coffeepot on to boil.
He sat down, scowling, his battered face looking ferocious in the firelight. Suddenly he said:

“Do you remember where Uncle Bené wanted you to go? Was it to Stony Creek?”

“Yes, sir. And we were to see someone named Castaway.”

“Castaway!”

“That's right. Tia remembered it last evening. But after all these years…”

“He may still be there. We'll look for him tomorrow. And it looks as if we can forget about Witch Mountain. Now, there's one thing that worries me. How much does that fellow Deranian know about you?”

“Not very much,” Tony replied. “I heard him talking to that other man, Werner Karman, just before you called to us back at the Kozak place. Years ago, when he left us at Granny's, he had no idea those people abroad were looking for us. When he found it out, and they sent him to get us, it seems they didn't do too much explaining. They just warned him about us—told him he could expect almost anything…”

“Hmm.” The priest rubbed a big hand over his jaw. “Obviously, the people who have been searching for you
knew
you would develop some very valuable abilities—even though you were both too young to show them at the time. They must have learned that from the other passengers in the lifeboat, the ones that weren't hurt too badly.”

Tia nodded, and Father O'Day asked, “Do you know what happened to them?”

“They—they died,” said Tony, repeating Tia's answer.

“And that left the two of you. Two small children who could be raised to do exactly as you were told. Two slaves with incredible
abilities…” Father O'Day stood up. He looked as angry as Tony had ever seen him. “Why, Tony, your power of vision alone would be priceless to them! If they suspect you have that—”